Asteroid flyby brings space rock closer than the moon

An asteroid the size of a baseball diamond passed between the Earth and the moon's orbit this afternoon.

Asteroid 2014 DX110, which is 30 metres across, madeits closest approach to Earth at 4 p.m. ET today, according to NASA. At that point, it wasjust 350,000 kilometres from Earth, about 35,000 kilometres closer than the moon is, on average.

NASA had saidthe asteroidwouldpass "safely" and that asteroids pass that close to Earth about 20 times a year.

The asteroid flyby wasstreamed live by at least a couple of organizations that connect robotic telescopes to the internet:

• The Italy-based Virtual Telescope Project, captured photos and video footage of the asteroid.
• U.S.-based Slooh.

Slooh addedthat it will be streaming the flyby of a much larger asteroid called 2014 CU13, which is up to 260 metres in diameter, on Sunday at 10 p.m. ET.